An Interview with Aaron Yoo

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Disturbia's rising star talks about the DVD.

By Christopher Monfette

Aaron Yoo is a young actor, indeed, and if the last year has proven anything - especially with the success of Transformers - it's that any young actor capable of holding their own in the company of Shia LaBeouf - as well as on the set of a D.J. Caruso film - is well on their way to a long and prosperous career.

Filling the role of Ronnie in the voyeuristic thriller Distrubia (hitting DVD on August 7), Yoo plays LaBeouf's energetic best friend with a manic, unrestrained energy carried over from his dynamic, real-life personality. Where Ronnie steps in to aid his friend through the loss of his father and subsequent house-arrest, he provides the film with a distinct comedic element.

"You gotta be careful of that," Yoo warns with a laugh. "You have to avoid being tagged as the Best Friend&#Array;I've read scripts where that character exists only to feed dialogue back to the main character. Fortunately, Ronnie has a real place in the story. It's friendship - it's love&#Array;He doesn't care about finding a killer or exposing the guy next door. What he cares about is that his friend - who didn't have an interest or care in the world since his father's death - now has something motivating him, and I think that makes Ronnie a real, sympathetic person."

Disturbia represents Yoo's first major, big-budget studio film and despite the fact that he's already wrapped production on Kevin Spacey's 21, he still maintains the excitement of a young, rising star.

"This is the stuff that you lay in bed at night thinking about&#Array;When I first found out I got the role, I ran around a parking lot flapping my arms and making chicken sounds. I really couldn't tell you why." He pauses, laughing, searching for his next few words. "The first really ridiculous moment is when we went out to take a look at the house&#Array;And D.J. looks around and says that this - what we're seeing - is only the front of the facade&#Array;The back of the house is in Pasadena somewhere. And inside of the house doesn't even really exist. They just built a whole entire home on two levels over at Paramount&#Array;Needless to say, it's kind of amazing."

"And working with D.J.," Yoo continues. "There's never a moment of uncomfortablility. He's that's kind of director, where you never feel anything but faith. D.J. knows exactly what he wants. He has the whole movie storyboarded and knows exactly what the shot is&#Array;And since he's already visualized the whole thing, he's totally comfortable deviating from what's inside that frame and being creatively loose within a certain structure."

Caruso's approach is evident in the film, which is brimming with dialogue and banter which must surely have evolved through editing and improvisation.

"Oh, It was all scripted," says Yoo, "and we'd start with that and build out. But there was always some level of improv&#Array;I remember D.J. once saying that if it works, it works. The way that you get there - if you stay on the page or have to move away - as long as the end product is killer, who cares? And I know that other sets are more structured and if you change a line, memos start flying through eight different departments&#Array;But there was a great degree of freedom here."

And any actor capable of going toe-to-toe in a scene with the charismatic LaBeouf better be prepared, cautions Yoo. "I learned more from Shia than I have from anyone, and I've gotten to work with some of my idols&#Array;Showing up to work with Shia on a daily basis - it's like stepping into the ring with Tyson in his prime. You have to be ready from the bell&#Array;He's so present emotionally. Just 150%.

"But there's a difference in those exchanges between trying to be funny and just being funny. You either are or you aren't. It is, or it isn't. And there would be scenes where we'd try to make them funnier than they were, and D.J. would just remind us that it wasn't necessary. Like icing a cake twice."

As the conversation comes to close, Yoo thinks back on the voyeuristic theme of the film with a surprising - and insightful - dismissal. "The function of the killer and watching him - whatever that says about the world in which we live - it was always more about that world than it was about the actual watching. What he goes through is a growth experience and the voyeurism is only a function of that - a learning tool. It's not simply a horror film or a thriller. People a half-hour into the film will ask if they've come to the right movie. And that's a good thing. That you get to care about the characters at first&#Array;and then you put them in danger.

Audiences can next see Yoo when 21 - the story of six infamous MIT students taking down Vegas - hits theatres in March of 2008.